In just a month and half, Pakistan has suffered four deadly Taliban attacks against Shia Muslims by Sunni Muslim extremists. But it is not just the Taliban that are trying to eliminate Shia from country. Local extremist groups like the Saudi-funded Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamaat openly advocate an anti-Shia ideology and are believed to be recruiting anti-Shia militants. With recent reports of an alliance between the Pakistani Taliban and the Islamic State group, the Shiite community could face even more bloodshed. (via France 24)

Masked paramilitary forces carried out an armed raid on the headquarters of the Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM), Pakistan’s fourth largest political party this week. One person was killed, at least 27 party workers were arrested and a collection of small arms was confiscated by the Pakistan Rangers. The immediate aftermath of the operation, however, is more questions than answers.

Waqas Ali Shah, a member of the party’s Central Information Committee died of gunshot wounds, though a spokesman for the Pakistan Rangers, Colonel Tahir, has told the media that “no one was killed.” The case is currently under investigation by local police.

Party officials claim that they have licenses for the weapons that were seized, and that they were held for defense. MQM has taken a strong anti-Taliban position in government, and their offices have been the target of repeated Taliban attacks.

Questions also remain as to what prompted the operation. Col. Tahir told reporters that “the raid was carried out on the orders of the Supreme Court and under the powers granted to Rangers by the federal government,” but a Tweet by Pakistani journalist Ali Kamran Chishti on March 3rd suggests that the operation was carried out under the authority of Pakistan’s Army leadership.

Major targeted operation by Rangers expected in #Karachi. Sources confirm they got the nod from GHQ.

These and other questions notwithstanding, one thing is clear. The spectacle of a paramilitary raid on a civilian political party office sends a strong message about the balance of power in Pakistan, and the very tenuous position of Pakistan’s democratically elected civilian leaders.

]]>http://americansforpakistan.com/2015/03/13/more-questions-than-answers-after-paramilitary-raid-on-mqm-offices/feed/0What Can Muslims do to Reclaim their beautiful Religion?http://americansforpakistan.com/2015/01/12/what-can-muslims-do-to-reclaim-their-beautiful-religion/
http://americansforpakistan.com/2015/01/12/what-can-muslims-do-to-reclaim-their-beautiful-religion/#commentsMon, 12 Jan 2015 20:49:42 +0000http://americansforpakistan.com/?p=2307In response to the murders of 12 journalists in Paris last week, a group of leading Muslim political and academic leaders including Farahnaz Ispahani, former member of Pakistan’s National Assembly, Public Policy Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center and a Director here at Americans for Democracy & Justice in Pakistan, signed a statement published in TheNew York Times on Sunday.

The statement reads:

As people observe beheadings and savagery by ISIS, female genital mutilations and honor killings, the abduction of girls by Boko Haram, the execution of innocents in Iran, the slaughtering and enslaving of Christians in Egypt and Africa and Yazidis in Iraq, rampant anti-Semitism and other crimes against humanity committed by those who claim to represent Islam, many people are understandably asking:

What is the true nature of Islam?

Is it that although there are many peaceful Muslims, Islam itself is not peaceful?

If Islam is a religion that stands for justice and peaceful coexistence, then the quest for an Islamic state cannot be justified as sanctioned by a just and merciful Creator.

Neither jihadism nor Islamism permit the equality of all humans irrespective of their race or religion and should therefore be rejected. Our denial and our relative silence must stop!

It is the duty of us Muslims to actively and vigorously affirm and promote universal human rights, including gender equality and freedom of conscience.

As our Holy Qu’ran states (4:135):

“Believers! Conduct yourselves with justice, bearing true witness before God, even if it be against yourselves, your parents, or your kin.”

We must engage in and promote reforms where necessary, including an honest and critical reinterpretation of scripture and shariah law used by Islamists to justify violence and oppression.

We must also recognize and loudly proclaim that the quest for any and all “Islamic State(s)” has no place in modern times. Theocracy, particularly, Islamism, is a proven failure. The path to justice and reform is through liberty.

It is also our responsibility to reclaim the faith we love from these monsters, forcefully rejecting and combating all components of their ideology.

If we Muslims believe that “true” Islam, genuinely aligned with the will of the Creator, is fundamentally peaceful, comprehensively merciful and objectively just, then it is our duty to do what is necessary to live and promote an Islam that is based in liberty and worthy of being called a beautiful religion.

We must seek out necessary support from non-Muslim allies in order to be successful in our work.

We the undersigned are Muslims who embrace a pluralistic interpretation of Islam, rejecting all forms of oppression and abuses committed in the name of religion or culture and particularly Islamism.

We are joined by non-Muslim allies who sign here to affirm their commitment as Americans to support those Muslims and all people of conscience who courageously speak out against these abuses and who advance reforms within our community.

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) established an important legal precedent in a recent ruling regarding freedom of speech in Pakistan. The decision involved a petition filed by the Shuhada Foundation, a non-profit organization affiliated with the extreme right-wing Lal Masjid in Islamabad, against TV coverage of music and dancing at recent anti-government protests in Pakistan’s capital. The IHC dismissed the petition and fined the petitioner for wasting the court’s time. In dismissing the petition, Justice Athar Minallah also gave the complainants some important advice: If you don’t like music, change the channel.

Justice Minallah’s advice has important implications when applied to other cases that involve complaints about offensive content such as those that seek to restrict the broadcast of international programming or allegations of blasphemy. In each of these cases, a court order is not required to remove the offensive content from the individual viewers television. They just need to change the channel.

The precedent established by the IHC also has bearings on another important issue: The now two-year-old blocking of YouTube in Pakistan. As with potentially objectionable content on television, no one is required to view any particular videos on YouTube or other online video sharing sites.

By making the individual responsible for his or her own viewing choices, the IHC’s decision strengthens Pakistan’s constitutionally-guaranteed freedoms of speech and access to information and limits the ability of anti-democratic forces to use legal cases as a weapon against minorities and other marginalized groups.

The Foreign Assistance Act “restricts assistance to the government of any country whose duly elected head of government is deposed by military coup or decree.” Over the past week, a military coup has become a distinct possibility, if not a fait accompli.

The head of Pakistan’s Army, General Raheel Sharif (not relation to the Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif), publicly intervened in Pakistan’s ongoing political crisis late Thursday night. According to a report in The Wall Street Journal, “The move follows a backroom political deal that government officials privately said ceded important powers over defense and foreign policy from the government to the military.”

While this may be the first time the Army has entered the public light, reports as far back as ten days ago described the military using the protests as leverage to seize political power.

As tens of thousands of protesters advanced on the Pakistani capital last week to demand his resignation, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif dispatched two emissaries to consult with the army chief.

He wanted to know if the military was quietly engineering the twin protest movements by cricket star-turned-politician Imran Khan and activist cleric Tahir ul-Qadri, or if, perhaps, it was preparing to stage a coup.

According to a government insider with a first-hand account of the meeting, Sharif’s envoys returned with good news and bad: there will be no coup, but if he wants his government to survive, from now on it will have to “share space with the army”.

If these reports are accurate, the Army would appear be attempting to carry out a “soft coup” – one that involves a transfer of power without the typical show of military force.

As Gen. Raheel stepped into the public spotlight as a mediator, Pakistan’s press reported that he was doing so at the request of the Prime Minister, a claim the Prime Minister has since publicly denied. Article 245 of Pakistan’s Constitution does permit the federal government to direct the Armed Forces to “act in aid of civil power,” but the real test will be the outcome. Whether or not the military can come to the aid of the federal government, Pakistan’s Constitution makes no provision for any transfer of power from democratically elected offices to the military, nor does it provide for “sharing space.”

Any military intervention in Pakistan’s government will have serious and debilitating consequences. A coup, not matter how “soft,” will set back democratic gains made over the last seven years by decades, severely jeopardizing the likelihood that Pakistan will be a modern, democratic country for the foreseeable future.

The military, too, stands to lose – both in resources and reputation. Gen. Raheel’s predecessor, General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, skillfully began rehabilitating the military’s relationship with the United States and its reputation as a threat to democratic order. The new military leadership’s decisions in the next few days could undo all of that progress – as well as cost them $280 million.

“We have a common agenda of development and economic revival, which is not possible to achieve without peace and stability in the region…Together we should rid the region of instability and insecurity…”

]]>http://americansforpakistan.com/2014/05/27/prime-minister-nawaz-sharif-addresses-media-after-talks-with-indian-counterpart/feed/0Pakistan’s Media Under Attackhttp://americansforpakistan.com/2014/05/23/pakistans-media-under-attack/
http://americansforpakistan.com/2014/05/23/pakistans-media-under-attack/#commentsFri, 23 May 2014 17:17:35 +0000http://americansforpakistan.com/?p=2260
Pakistani journalist Raza Rumi survived an assassination attempt in March that killed his driver. He and other liberals have been targeted for criticizing Islamist militancy and a blasphemy law.
]]>http://americansforpakistan.com/2014/05/23/pakistans-media-under-attack/feed/0Protecting Pakistan’s Journalistshttp://americansforpakistan.com/2014/04/25/protecting-pakistans-journalists/
http://americansforpakistan.com/2014/04/25/protecting-pakistans-journalists/#commentsFri, 25 Apr 2014 18:36:44 +0000http://americansforpakistan.com/?p=2254

Pakistan has always been a dangerous place for journalists, but threats to their safety have never been as multifaceted as they are today. Some of these threats arise from the state itself, or its institutions, which try to monopolize the rhetoric and narrative on certain “sensitive issues.” But the most dangerous of them come from extremist groups. These groups have the same interest as the military in controlling the national narrative on certain issues. Unlike the military, these groups have a far more expansive list of journalist no-no’s, which, if breached, warrant an immediate green-light for murder.

The Pakistani government responded to the attack on Hamid Mir by setting up a judicial probe commission. Often, these commissions can keep their findings confidential and inaccessible to the public at large. Other times, if a victim survives an attempt on their life, they can be provided ad hoc and provisional police protection at the discretion of the provincial police service. However, there are no institutionalized mechanisms journalists rely upon to guarantee their long-term safety.

The situation was perhaps even worse in Colombia, where journalists were regularly killed by both the military and the narco-terrorists for reporting on the brutal fighting between the two forces and political corruption. The situation has calmed down considerably in the recent times, but Mexico has concurrently faced an uptick of violence against journalists by drug cartels. These cartels have been waging a war among themselves and against Mexican anti-drug authorities, and target journalists who are dedicated to covering all aspects of the drug war.

Both countries have created a two-part regime in order to deal with violence against journalists. First, they created a specialized agency in their ministries of interior to provide police protection to journalists who have faced threats. Mexico created the “Protection Mechanism for Human Rights Defenders and Journalists” for its interior ministry to handle requests for police protection from journalists. Colombia has similarly tasked its National Protection Agency with providing security to journalists. Colombia has also put in place a procedure to evaluate threats to journalists through its Risk Evaluation Committee, which can offer “relocation assistance, bulletproof vests, armed escorts, and armored cars”.

The administration of this protection service can range from a purely federal force of officers tasked with protecting journalists and collecting intelligence about their threats, or special wings in the provincial police created to carry out the same task.

Second, both countries are working on amending their penal codes to make violence or murder against a journalist a special crime, allowing the Attorney Generals to pursue those as specialized cases. As such, Mexico created “the Special Prosecutor’s Office for Crimes against Journalist,” which exclusively investigates and prosecutes crimes against journalists. Though the special prosecutor has been criticized for failing to prosecute cases effectively, the office has the potential of satisfying the need for a judicial institution that can provide security and support for the valuable work journalists perform.

It is the nature of the work that journalists perform which inspired the United Nations to create a Plan of Action on the Safety of Journalists and the Issue of Impunity. This document begins with a powerful quote from Barry James, a French reporter and editor, who said: “Every journalist killed or neutralized by terror is an observer less of the human condition. Every attack distorts reality by creating a climate of fear and self-censorship.”

Journalists provide a special public service with their work by informing the public of wrongdoings, whether by cops or by robbers. This leaves them open to attacks from both sides, the criminal underworld and the state agencies tasked with battling them. Further, due to the public nature of their work, journalists can be easily identified and targeted, unlike common citizens. These are some of the reasons the United Nations has moved to recognize the international problem of violence against journalists.

The report goes onto state that “the threat [to journalists] posed by non-state actors such as terrorist organizations and criminal enterprises is growing.” The UN Plan has been to “strengthen legal frameworks and enforcement mechanisms designed to ensure the safety of journalists.” This includes providing advice and resources to countries attempting to protect journalists, while also encouraging various UN agents and groups to report threats to journalists among the international community. Various UN organizations study threats to journalists, such as the Special Rapporteur on the Promotion and Protection of the Right to Freedom of Opinion and Expression, and UNESCO, which publishes biennial reports on journalist safety around the globe.

None of these are overnight solutions to the threats faced by Pakistani journalists. Despite changing their penal codes and creating agencies to protect journalists, there is criticism that the Colombian and Mexican authorities are not doing enough. However, unless Pakistan’s government begins the long process of addressing the multifaceted threats to reporters with institutionalized protection mechanisms in the form of new laws and agencies, the future of Pakistani journalism is grim.

]]>http://americansforpakistan.com/2014/04/25/protecting-pakistans-journalists/feed/0Atlantic Council Report Calls for India and Pakistan to Reinvest in Economic Relationshttp://americansforpakistan.com/2014/04/24/atlantic-council-report-calls-for-india-and-pakistan-to-reinvest-in-economic-relations/
http://americansforpakistan.com/2014/04/24/atlantic-council-report-calls-for-india-and-pakistan-to-reinvest-in-economic-relations/#commentsThu, 24 Apr 2014 19:29:49 +0000http://americansforpakistan.com/?p=2249WASHINGTON – A report released today by the Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center argues that heavy military spending in India and Pakistan has in fact been detrimental to the citizens of both countries in terms of security and economic growth, and calls on leaders to reinvest in trade and confidence building.

In India and Pakistan: The Opportunity Cost of Conflict, Atlantic Council South Asia Center Director Shuja Nawaz and Nonresident Senior Fellow Mohan Guruswamy explain how high defense spending and low economic integration into South Asia’s regional economy have come at the expense of those living in poverty. Although many now favor rapprochement, Nawaz and Guruswamy argue that unless both sides begin a dialogue on economic and military relations, these issues will only worsen.

In addition to military spending, a lack of strong bilateral trade relations between India and Pakistan has also exacerbated South Asia’s socioeconomic challenges. From GDP to job losses to investment, the non-fulfillment of trading potential is a cost that “neither of the two countries can afford to ignore.”

Nawaz and Guruswamy provide a set of actions both countries can take to decrease military spending and promote confidence building:

Increase the distance between land forces by withdrawing from border areas

Engage in direct communications between militaries, including exchange visits

Invest jointly in energy, water, and export industries

Open borders for trade and eventually tourism

Such measures will have a lasting impact beyond India and Pakistan, as the authors note: “economically intertwined and mutually beneficial economic systems in both countries will create a huge peace constituency that will not only be good for the two nations, but also for the region and the entire world.”

Pakistan’s Chief Justice, Tassaduq Hussain Jillani, said on Friday that the people’s freedoms cannot be violated or limited in the interests of national security, adding that human rights cannot be ignored at any cost.